Author's Notes: I wanted to explore a slightly darker characterisation of Remus and the idea that his nobility in trying to protect Tonks by leaving only hurt her more. I think I did okay on the first but the second one is only mention. Enjoy. Or don't.

set during OOTP. title from the song "Way Back Into Love" from the movie Music & Lyrics because I was listening to it while trying to think of a title. I think the song works for this fic.

Nymphadora Tonks, as Remus Lupin first met her, was pretty-but-average, professional, quiet, and exactly his type. The Nymphadora Tonks in his bed is too pretty for words and most decidedly not quiet but she still somehow manages to be his type.

("I was nervous," she'll tell him when he mentions it. "I thought people wouldn't react well to pink hair and denims. And I did a good job the first meeting, didn't I?"

She had—up until she'd tripped over the troll leg umbrella stand, woken up the portraits, broken three plates, and turned a shocking shade of red. But no one held it against her.)

When Remus was young, he dreamt of being in love the same way the muggle boys around him dreamt about being superheroes: with no real expectation it would happen but still holding out hope. There'd been girls over the years of course—a pretty Ravenclaw in sixth year, who had dark hair and an airy laugh and whose name he can't remember for the life of him, a woman named Rhiannon who dyed her hair a black-blue and didn't mind his furry little problem until the financial strain became too much, and a pretty thing he met in a muggle bar one night, although it couldn't really be called love or even a relationship but it had lasted a while.

So there were girls but rarely anything serious, and Nymphadora is very serious about him. He can't—won't—admit how shocking it is. Rhiannon was a strange woman who collected seashells and left them scattered all over the floor of her flat. She wore bangles and was fond of the colour yellow. She laughed easily and talked with her hands. She edited books for a living and often would sit next to him while working so he could explain something or another to her or so they could laugh about flowery language. She liked sitting out in the rain without an umbrella and meditating. Remus always spent that time wondering if she'd catch a cold.

But Rhiannon was a distant memory now. The girl in the club had been the most recent, and even that had been a couple years ago, and he'd sworn off women in that time, promised himself he wouldn't get his hopes up for love or even sex.

But Nymphadora is in his bed and although he wants to push her out for her own good, he draws her closer and sinks into her warmth.

Nymphadora wears her hair in a shade of pink that reminds him of the roses outside Lily Potter's home.

Lily grew roses since her mother did. They were usually well taken care of but when the war got worse, the bushes fell in a state of overgrowth and then decay. But he remembers it like it was the day she showed them happily to a group of boys who didn't care but pretended to since Lily didn't have anyone else to show them to. The roses were pink because Lily loved pink. They were sweet and fragrant in the summertime, and there was always a vase of them on the Potters' kitchen table. The last time he'd seen the roses had been the day after his mother's funeral, when Lily had hesitantly handed him an artfully arranged bouquet with baby's breath mixed in, an arrangement his mother had seen in a shop one day and loved but didn't buy for herself. He only vaguely remembers thanking Lily for them since he couldn't afford any, but he remembered placing them on his mother's grave and wondering when the numbness would give way to the pain.

He thinks about telling Nymphadora this, but he knows she'll apologise and change her hair and that's not what he wants. He likes the colour, likes the reminder, which only stings a little now. He likes that the colour that he once associated with his friends and family is now happy again.

When he first met her, Nymphadora's hair was a rich toffee, edges curved around her chin. It was a nice colour, he thought, but now that he knows her better, he knows that pink is her, from the colour of her cheeks when she's embarrassed herself to the plushness of her lips to the flush that covers her from head to toe when his fingers tease up her thighs. Pink is very much her colour and he'd say it out loud if he thought he could say it in a way that made him sound gentlemanly and not lecherous.

("I don't mind you being lecherous," she'll laugh against his neck. "I like my men a little lecherous.")

He thinks lecherous is bad, but he's craving, every single day now, a woman's body. It's not always lecherous—sometimes, he'll see Molly and Arthur Weasley cuddled up by the fire and want that too. It's touch he wants, he realises, and he doesn't get it very often. It's usually in the form of slapped shoulders and accidental brushes and Nymphadora is the first person in a long time to touch him deliberately and the only woman. She brushes her fingertips over his hand when she's close to him, hugs him hello and goodbye, leans her head on his shoulder when she's tired, sits too close with her thigh brushing his.

He's the only person she does this to, and most of it's so subtle no one notices, but he does. He notices every time it happens, which is often, and he kisses her tentatively at four in the morning in the Grimmauld Place library, not sure what he wants but knowing she's part of it.

She takes his indecisiveness well, better than he does, and she takes to his bed night after night but doesn't speak of love and relationships even though they're two months gone. He wonders sometimes if they should broach the topic so he asks, "What are we doing?"

"Having sex," she says as she stretches. Her hair is plastered against her glowing face and the flush of sex has yet to leave her skin. Her toes curl into his leg. "Do you want more?" she asks quietly, hesitantly, dark eyes peeking up at him beneath her lashes. "I can offer more."

"I don't know what I want," he says honestly. "I'd given up on women."

She laughs, and he feels the vibrations where her body is pressed against his. "You're not doing a very good job of it, Remus."

"I managed three years."

They are silent for several long moments. Then she sits up and he shivers at the loss of contact and sits up as well.

"Why?" she asks.

"Why what?"

"Why did you give up women?"

And what does he say to that? He's never told anyone why, not honestly, not even Sirius. But she's looking at him with wide sad eyes and he can't stop himself. "I can't even love me," he admits, nearly inaudible but her fallen face tell him she hears him. "I'm a monster. I can't keep a job. I'm more cowardly than I can admit to. I don't know why the Sorting Hat put me in Gryffindor at all. Maybe back then I still had some hope. Now... I'll die and who will miss me? Sirius is drunk too often and he barely spends any time with me. Harry might be sad, but he'll get over it. I'm not his uncle like I once was. My relationship with my father has been strained for years. Who else is there now?"

"There's me," she offers with a trembling smile. "I'll love you—I already do."

"The last woman who loved me," he says, ignoring her words because he doesn't know what to do with them, "loved me until my inability to help with the bills got a little too much. And she made good money, better than you make," he adds without thinking. "I didn't think I used that much money but maybe I did. I didn't even buy any expensive potions for my transformations."

"I..."

"I'm sorry, Nymphadora—"

"Don't call me—"

"Tonks. I'm sorry. I can't return the sentiment right now."

She straightens a little from where she slumped down in hurt. "But you might be able to?" she asks hopefully.

"What are you doing here?" he wants to know. "Why are you in bed if you love me?"

"I thought this might be the only way to be with you," she confesses sadly, picking at a stray thread on the sheets.

He watches her and wonders what it would be like to love her, to have those little moments of intimacy and rapport and not just the moments when she's flushed and curled around him. He wonders what she'll be like on a date, how many times she'll fall, how sweet her embarrassed face is. How sweet she is, bringing him tea carefully and sharing her chocolate, always asking how he is and how his day has been, letting him talk her ear off about things she doesn't know or care about. In retrospect, he wants to know how he never noticed she did all those things until now. Until she looks at him with dark eyes and a tense smile and he thinks, Yes, I could probably return your feelings.

The thoughts smacks into him and bowls him over, and it's not unlike her in that respect.

He leans over, kisses her gently, and she makes a noise of surprise under his mouth then sinks into his mouth. "Let's go out on a date," he suggests.

He may know what led her to his bed now, but he doesn't know what led him to take her there. He can't remember any specific moment where he decided to do so. All he knows is she is colour and warmth and love and sunshine and all of those things have missing from his life too long. And maybe that was the reason he kissed her that night. Maybe it was her pink hair and denim miniskirt and bright smile. Maybe she was what he was missing, and he only knew it subconsciously then.

But he's almost sure of it now, with their first date winding down. Time and money restraints left them with little options, so she'd taken him to get fish and chips at a park. They'd eaten already and now they're walking along the cobblestone path, holding hands and talking quietly in the darkening light. He lets her know about his past hobby of bird watching and points out the ones he remembers.

"I don't remember why I started anyway," he says and she laughs. "I mean it, Nymphadora—Tonks—I never liked birds. There were always birds around when I was growing up, and they were bloody annoying. They were my alarm every morning whether I wanted them to be or not."

"My muggle aunt does bird watching. She says it might be more interesting if there were more exotic birds around."

"I don't care how exotic they are. If they chirp I never want to hear them again."

She laughs oh-so-sweetly, and he takes in her sparkling eyes and can't help but smile too.

When he thinks about the past, he thinks in colour.

James had far too many green jumpers, many of them the same style, all of them the same shade. Sirius owned shiny leather in brown—trousers, jackets, boots. Peter liked the colour blue best. Lily had far too many pink clothes that clashed horribly with her hair. His mother wore red often. His father has a penchant for tan clothes.

Lily wore a gold gown and James wore a muggle suit with a red tie their wedding day. Remus, Sirius, and Peter wore gold ties and red shirts. Sirius wore his newly bought leather boots and the sun reflected too harshly off of them and Lily told him they didn't go with his suit.

Harry was swaddled in royal purple blankets when Remus first saw him.

Lily was dressed in her favourite pink dress for her burial. Her skin was somehow paler in the death than it had been in life. Her make-up was done. She wore lipstick which she hated when she was alive. It was a soft pearly pink, one that would have matched her lip colour while alive if not for the shine. It looked unnatural on her face now. James was dressed in his favourite clothes too—jumper in a rich green and faded well-worn denims. He didn't have his black glasses on. Remus almost asked how he would see if he didn't have them and remembered why he didn't need them now.

He'd run out of the funeral with people staring at him and thrown up in the dying autumn leaves. Red, gold, orange. He never wanted to see them again.

Nymphadora wears a silver dress and takes him to nice muggle restaurant for their second date. She insists on paying because "it's not the fifties any more" and "you paid for the fish and chips." Her hair is blonde, long, and impossibly sleek, and she looks older, more poised. It's a very strange look on her, the too feminine dress, the too normal hair, the too mature look. He's uncomfortable with it and although she's horribly embarrassed to flip her utensils in the air, dip her hair in her food, kick him under the table and slip on the smooth floor when she gets up to go to the bathroom, he's relieved.

He likes her like that, he thinks. Not hurt, he clarifies for himself. Not young either, because that makes him feel sleazy sometimes. But he likes her like that, messy and imperfect and all the more lovely for it.

When she slides back into her seat, her hair is shorter, her eyes lowered.

"Is something wrong?"

"I'm sorry," she says. "I meant to—I wanted to be pretty tonight and I can't even do that."

"You are pretty," he says confusedly.

She glances up at him, looks down at her plate, and it occurs to him that she's young. Which he'd known but hadn't known. She is young, and he remembers being her age, wondering what your date thought of you when you had spinach wrapped around a tooth and hadn't realised it or when you stumbled over your words because you didn't want to say the wrong thing. When you were not quite sure if at the end of the date there'd be another one or if you messed up horribly and they'd never want to see you again.

Maybe she wanted to show him she wasn't too young, but he knows that or he wouldn't have met her in way he did. She wouldn't have been at the Order meeting if she wasn't old enough, strong enough, mature enough.

He reaches across the table and takes her hand. It's the first time he ever initiates a non-sexual touch. She looks up him, distressed and trying to hide it. "I know you," he says, "and it's not this woman. You never have to change for me, Nymphadora—don't look at me like, it's a lovely name. I am here with you because I want to get to know you better not because you need to prove something to me."

She smiles tremulously.

Their dates happen in between Order meetings and work and making sure Sirius hasn't drunk himself into a coma. They go to muggle places—a steakhouse, the cinema, a bar to see a Rolling Stone tribute band. She takes him dancing once, and they lasted ten minutes before she realised it was a bad idea, so they went to the pub next door, ate chips, drank weak beer, and talked about his youth when he still did this often. She brings a tray of desserts from a new shop by where she lives and a bottle of champagne and they sit in the library and talk about nothing in front of the fire.

They don't have sex.

It's by mutual, unspoken agreement that their dates end in heated kisses and nothing else. He misses seeing her in his bed, feeling her supple skin against his, going to sleep with her hair tickling his shoulder. But he doesn't really miss them too much. There's too much to discover with her clothed. There's the way she laughs when he makes dry comments. There's the way she beams at him when he starts planning their dates. There's the way she wraps her arms around his waist and the way she scratches her nails lightly through his hair after the full moon, gently soothing him to sleep. There's falling asleep in front of the fireplace, her head on his shoulder and arms around him. Her eyelashes are long, and they tickle at his collarbone when she pulls his shirt out of place in her slumber.

He likes to study her face when she falls asleep and marvel at how lovely she is, how affectionate she is without thought, how bewitching she is without knowing what she's doing. Her easy charm unnerves him and soothes him in equal measure. And he isn't sure how to deal with it.

After Voldemort was rendered powerless, the wizarding world lit up with sound and light. Remus, conversely, started buying things in shades of grey. A dark grey couch, a table that may have been white at some point, jumpers in pale grey, trousers in dark grey. It's the colour of the rain clouds that live in England and he wears it like armour and camouflage all at once and has for fourteen years.

Even Nymphadora hasn't touched that yet.

But she does for Christmas, stubbornly refusing to take back the gifts she gives him and reminding him his clothes have been through the wringer and he was cold their last mission. He can't argue with that since he hasn't bought any new in a decade and the winter chill seeps through him when he goes outside. So he reluctantly accepts the large package and opens it.

Inside are two pairs of black trousers, a long black coat, and three jumpers in red, blue, and green. There's thick winter socks at the bottom. It isn't as bad as he expects. He almost expected a whole new wardrobe.

"It's not charity," she says when he doesn't immediately say something. "I worry about you. I want to take care of you. You don't care about yourself properly."

"I don't care about myself," he says without thinking. He catches her flinch out of the corner of his eye. "But I am honoured you do," he says honestly and lets his kiss say what he doesn't have the guts to admit even to himself.

Nymphadora likes to make snow angels, he learns in January. Her hair is blue and he's wearing his new red jumper and they're in the backyard of the small cottage he owns. She's laughing on the ground, snow stuck to her denims and dusting her hair, her snow angel a little too messy from her excited movements. She's utterly winsome in her unassuming way and he's shaken up by it, by the way he smiles when she does, by the way she looks up him fervently, incandescently, alluringly. He steps towards her before he knows what he's doing, crouches next to her, brushes the snow out of her hair. He is bewildered by the way she leans into his touch for he's still not used to it four months after the first time he took her to bed.

He has always felt like a monster. Even before people knew he was, he felt like it. Felt like something was clawing at him, trying desperately to get through. It's only his parents' lessons and his own fear that kept him from acting on it.

"You want to know something?" he asks and doesn't need to see her curious agreement to know it will come. Which is something he can't help but be amazed by. His friends were the only people who ever really wanted to know anything about him. "I... I don't feel like a monster with you."

"Good. You're not."

He shakes his head, trying to put to words what he wants to say.

"Remus?" She shifts and wraps her arms around him.

"I—The last relationship I was in wasn't even a relationship. It was a muggle woman named Sarah who was a waitress a bar. She would go home with me every once in a while. It went on for a couple of years. We called it a relationship after six months. But I couldn't tell you anything about her other than she was studying law at her university."

"Another younger woman?" she teases.

"Yes." He swallows thickly. "It's horrifying how much I need to be reminded of my youth nowadays. I thought—Well, if she thought I was funny and handsome then who was I to inform her otherwise? I needed to be reminded what it was like to still think you could do anything. I—" He takes a deep breath. "It ended badly. It was too close to the full moon. Her—She—I—In the heat of the moment, I bit her thigh hard. She probably still has the mark. I wonder what she thinks of that. I just—It's the first time I ever lost control. I hated myself. Still do. But that urge has always been there."

"To bite during sex?"

"To bite in general. To bite someone's throat out when I'm angry. To bite to claim during sex. Just to bite. It feels like a worse curse than the transformations," he admits cautiously. "It's a constant feeling. It takes everything in me to control it. It's not one night out of the month. I hate it. And I—I can't stand myself for it."

He's never told anyone this. He can't look at her face.

"Oh, Remus," she says tenderly. "You're not a monster."

"But I am cursed."

She hesitates because even she can't disagree with that. "I think," she says slowly, "your desire to control it is noble. But you can't deny yourself your very human emotions because sometimes the wolf wants to let out his."

"It's not—"

"Unless you get the urge to bite someone every minute of every day, it's not all the time."

"I want to bite you right now."

"Rip my throat out bite or claiming bite?"

He still won't look at her face but she sounds amused.

"Currently, rip your throat out biting."

"Well, don't do that. You won't be able to leave love bites."

He glances up at her. She's smiling.

"I should leave you," he says quietly. He picks up her hand and traces patterns on her palm. "I should walk away before I hurt you. Before you learn to hate me. I couldn't bear it from you. I don't want to do anything to hurt you."

"Your nobility is admirable." Her words have a edge of sarcasm to them. Then gently, "Have you ever considered the fact that your noble need to do what's best for me hurts me? I am happy with you and I don't care if you want to litter my thighs with bite marks. I've been known to like it rough. I know what you are. My parents will support us if we need money. Sirius will support us. We have friends, Remus. I will never hate you for something that isn't your fault." She takes his face in her hands and makes him look at her. "You are not alone, Remus Lupin. Don't you dare think you are."

Teenage Sirius Black was moody and temperamental with an pinch of macabre humour and a dash of regular humour. This adult Sirius Black is slower to anger but more sombre. He rarely laughs when it's just the two of them. It takes a group of people and a long discussion to lighten his mood.

Remus tells him he's dating Nymphadora three days before Valentine's Day. Sirius looks up slowly from his drink and stares at him. "Okay, Moony," he says and he goes back to his drink and doesn't respond to anything Remus says afterwards.

"I want my friend back," Remus tells her sadly while they eat sandwiches and crisps in the dim light of the kitchen. "But I don't know this man. I can't call him Padfoot because he's not. He's so grim. I hoped—Well, I thought this summer he'd be okay, but he only laughs around Harry. I can't tell if the laughter is even real."

"He's been through a terrible ordeal."

"I know. I was alone for so long. I just wanted a friend back. I thought that wish was granted."

"I'm sorry."

He drops his head in his hands. He doesn't feel hungry. "I know I can't truly imagine what he's been through. I don't think I could handle hearing it even. He's strong but I don't think he's strong enough to pull through."

She eyes him over the sandwich in her hand. "I can't offer you any reassurances," she says sadly. "Because I agree with you."

He nods once and pushes his plate away.

"Would your friends have liked me?" she asks.

He's never celebrated Valentine's before, so she took him to on a "proper clichéd dinner" and now they're sitting on the back porch of Grimmauld, sharing a bottle of butterbeer.

"Of course they would have. Lily was a bit clumsy too. She always managed to knock her toes on chairs and walls and she banged her head on shelves too often. She hated being the clumsy one."

"Are you telling me she'd like me because she wouldn't be the clumsiest on there?" she laughs.

"No. She would probably want to make you her dress-up doll. Not many people knew this but Lily was very feminine. Before she discovered she was a witch, she briefly wanted a career as a fashion designer. She did make some of her own clothes before the war got too bad. She was a strong fighter and she wouldn't have stayed away. She made Harry's clothes, though."

"That must be a nice thing to be able to do. I'll bet she never had to settle for designs she didn't like because she couldn't find anything else."

"Probably not," he chuckles. "Sirius loves you, we know that. Back then, he would have been better in showing it. He would have told you all my dirty little secrets and taken great pleasure in seeing how red you and I could get. Peter—Peter would have loved your humour."

"Great, maybe if I catch him I can make him laugh so he'll come easier," she mutters.

"And James loved enthusiasm. He was a firm believer that the only way to do things was enthusiastically. So he would have been instantly charmed by you."

"How about your parents?"

"You can meet my father, if you'd like," he says without thinking. She makes him do that often. When she starts with surprise, he adds, "He's not as bad as I've made him out to be. We've had our differences over the years. I don't think he ever knew what to do with a werewolf son. My mother softened our arguments when she was around. Both of us would have done anything for her. And to answer your question, she would have loved you because you make me happy. That's all she ever truly wanted for me."

Nymphadora smiles so brightly at him, he forgets it's dark outside.

He takes her to bed for the first time since they begun dating.

Valentine's Day may be a cliché day to do it but he doesn't really care. Not when she's naked and crawling up on his lap. Not when she laughs as he tickles her side on accident or when he's done playing with her nipples and she morphs her hair into the same shade of pink as them in amusement. Not when she's moving slowly against him, forehead pressed against his and her breath smelling sweet as it blew across his face.

There is nothing wrong in this, he thinks. He's always called it wrong in his own head, hated himself for wanting such a pretty young thing, hated himself for using her. But she never seemed to mind, and it's not like that any more anyway, and he can't think there's something wrong with this. His heart is full to bursting, and he thinks he finally remembers how to live again.

They'll fight and argue and there will be problems that have nothing to do with whose turn it is to pay for dinner. They'll love each to hatred and back. But they'll persevere. He knows they will.

"You look a little too thoughtful for what we're doing," she rasps out. She clenches her muscles around him. "Come back to me."

"I'm with you," he promises, voice gravelly, tightening one arm around her. He uses the other hand to brush her hair out of her blown-wide eyes. She's staring at him, half in amusement and half in lust. "You're beyond stunning," he whispers against her lips before he kisses. She makes a protesting noise and jerks away.

"You can't just say things like that and then kiss me," she objects hoarsely. "Give me a moment to bask in it."

He laughs and kisses her again and again until she's moaning softly into his mouth. He feels her ride out her orgasm and can't hold back his own.

She doesn't move off of him, even when they've both stopped panting and have exchanged a myriad of small light kisses.

"What were you thinking about?" she asks against his lips. "Come on, tell me, or I'll think I wasn't good enough to hold your attention."

"Don't think that. Never that," he says. He brushes her hair out of her face again and flicks his eyes to the ceiling. When was the last time he said those three little words? Years ago probably. But he's never meant them more even though they feel heavy and strange on his tongue.

"I was thinking about how right we are together. And... how much I love you."

Her answering smile may as well have been the sun.